Clean Seas ready to commercialise its Southern Bluefin Tuna

Australia’s Clean Seas Tuna has reported that they have produced the first commercially bred Southern Bluefin Tuna in the world.

Clean Seas was forced into a trading halt on Monday after a staggering 38% jump in their share price.

“The company reports that its trials are consistently achieving high levels of quality fertilised eggs and larvae for propagation, and that forward planning for commercialisation of Southern Bluefin Tuna has now commenced,” they said in a statement. “Shareholders are again cautioned regarding the risks in this complex research and development phase. We are, however, optimistic that our team can replicate the production of large quantities of larvae for future commercialisation.”

A further update will be provided at the end of April but production could be underway before the end of the year.

If all the fertislised eggs and larvae that Clean Seas has in their tanks were to grow into fish suitable for sale then they would have almost 20 times the amount the whole Australian Southern Bluefin Tuna industry produces in a year.

“We’ve got virtually unlimited amount of fertilised eggs,” the company’s Chairman, Hagen Stehr, told the ABC. “That means that we’ve got fertilised eggs, we’ve got larvae, we’ve closed the cycle, and we’re now looking for commercialisation. If every larvae we got would become a tuna we have roughly worked it out – we have something like 18 years’ annual production of tuna at Arno Bay at present.”